It would seem more and more mobiles are being designed for the common man with little luxuries such as color screens and integrated FM radios. Intex made an appearance in the mobile scene in a big way only recently, with devices that range from simple to loaded. The Flair is one of their base-model FM radio mobiles, and here's what I found when I reviewed the device.

Form Factor
This candybar mobile is simple in design and has a certain feel-good factor. The keys are really large and easy to use. The only problem I had was with the two top keys for the Menu and Phone Book – they seemed unusually hard and unresponsive at times. Then again, it could be a problem with just this particular handset.

The 1.5 inch CSTN display, which sports a resolution of 128 x 128 pixels and 65K colors, is decently clear and easy to read. The navigation joystick is not ergonomic – it's a bit too embedded into the phone. Ideally I would have preferred a navigation pad.

The 2.5mm earphone socket is located on one side, just above the volume control keys. On the other side is a key that appears to be a camera key – but the I-1107 has no camera! So it activates an LED bulb located at the rear of the handset, and acts as a torch. I can’t say the light is too bright, but in pitch darkness it's definitely handy. I have to admit that having a dedicated key to activate the torch is a great idea. The charging port is located at the bottom.

Features and Performance
The simple menu is exactly like any Motorola’s, so if you’re switching you won't have a problem finding your way around. One annoyance is that Intex tried in vain to make this a jazzy phone by including some really offbeat ringtones. In a simple phone I’d expect a simple tring-tring, but no dice. Same with the message alerts. Don’t get me wrong; it’s so loud you wont have a problem hearing it. The question is, would you want anyone else to?

Another issue I faced with the I-1107 is with regard to its main feature, the FM radio. It has no auto tuning. If you don’t know the preexisting channels frequencies you’re gonna have a hell of a time setting them up initially. And manual tuning can be a real bitch. Even when you find the existing channels frequencies on your own, there's no option to save them – you’ll have to go back to the radio menu and enter it manually into the channel list.

The I-1107 doesn’t seem to allow you to simply skip to the next channel without going to the channel list again. Reception is fairly good in most places in the city. The phone also has a sound recorder, but as there isn’t too much internal memory I wouldn’t recommend that you try to record that concert.